06-30-2013
• Free Press Publications
On June 26, the Supreme Court issued two landmark decision in the cases of Hollingsworth v. Perry and United States v. Windsor. In Hollingsworth the court was asked “Whether the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment prohibits the State of California from defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman.” And in Windsor the court was to decide “Whether Section 3 of DOMA violates the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection of the laws as applied to persons of the same sex who are legally married under the laws of their State.”
In the Hollingsworth decision, the court held that the “[p]etitioners did not have standing to appeal the District Court’s order” and “vacated and remanded" the District Court ruling. In other words, since officials in California decided not to defend the case themselves, no one else is able to defend the case.
The decision in Windsor is where the court actually overturned the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Justice Kennedy writes in